Rabbit Hole
by Swing Girl At Heart
Summary: Blaine's hiding something, and when Kurt gets involved, there's a lot more at stake than singing competitions.  Expect The Unexpected.
1. Prologue

****A/N: So, this is part of the Expect The Unexpected series I'm working on, which is, frankly, exactly what it sounds like. As part of my everlasting quest to defy any and all possible cliches, something completely unfathomable occurs with one member of the Glee club in each fic of the series. The goal? To have each character put so far out of their league that they should be OUT of character, but still remain IN character. This is installment number fifteen (holy hell), but none of them are connected plot-wise, so there aren't any prequels you have to read for any of them. Some will be tragic, some scary, some mysterious, some humorous. Enough jabber - please enjoy!****

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><p><strong><strong>_Prologue__****  
><strong>**_

Kurt's breath fogged in front of his nose as he crouched behind a metal shelf, the putrid subterranean air clogging his nostrils and making him want to vomit. He looked down at his shaking hands, their skin turned green in the odd lighting of the underground room. There were only four fluorescents on the ceiling and two smaller ones directly over the worktable at the other end of the room, and the weak light from them was passing through the shelves fully stocked with jars of every shape and size. Kurt tried not to look at the contents of the jars, squeezing his eyes shut as he tried to listen to anything that might be happening on the floor above.

He barely managed to suppress a startled gasp when he heard the latch on the door click open and the hinges squeal. "Blaine?" called a man's voice. "Are you down there?"

Kurt held his hand over his mouth and nose, trying to hide the sound of his uneven breathing as his blood roared in his ears. The stairs leading down from the door creaked as the man descended, and Kurt's eyes began wildly searching for a way out.

"Blaine?"

His heart skipped a beat when he saw another door set into the wall behind the furthest shelf. The door was only two and a half feet tall and it looked like it hadn't been opened in years, not to mention the fact that Kurt had absolutely no idea how far underground he was, but it was Kurt's only chance at getting out without being seen.

Taking a deep breath in a weak attempt to steady his shaking hands, Kurt rolled onto his knees, feeling the dampness of the hard-packed dirt floor seep into his jeans, and watched the man glance once more around the room, then shake his head and shrug, turning to bend over his worktable, tying an apron streaked with old blood around his middle.

Kurt fought the urge to gag and crawled towards the small door, trying his best to not let his shoes scuff against the floor. He ducked behind another shelf, peering between the jars to make sure that the man was still working…

…and knocked a beaker off the lowest shelf.

The glass shattered on the ground, spilling luminescent green liquid across the floor, the unbelievably pungent smell of formaldehyde exploding into the musty air and making Kurt's eyes water.

"Who's there?" The man had turned around and… oh god. A pistol was in his hand, ready to shoot.

Kurt glanced at his exit, made a quick decision, and launched to his feet, running for it as fast as he could.

"Hey!" the man shouted. A shot roared through the air, and three of the jars on the shelf closest to Kurt exploded. He felt the skin on his cheek rip open as a flying shard of glass sliced through it, but he kept running until he reached the door.

Another shot cut a hole in the wood slats covering the wall above his head, and Kurt flinched at the splinters that showered over him. He rattled the latch on the door, but it had rusted over years ago and wasn't unlocking easily. A third bullet whistled past his ear and embedded itself in the wall. _Come on, come ON,_ Kurt pleaded silently. His fingers were starting to hurt from pulling on the latch, and flakes of rust were sticking to his palms.

As the fourth shot missed his head by a mere inch and a half, Kurt finally succeeded in opening the latch and pulling the door open. Without pausing to look through the opening to see what lay beyond, he dove through, yanking the door shut behind him and plunging into total darkness.

His chest heaving and his eyes still watering, Kurt quickly began to crawl through the shadows, feeling the loamy soil squish between his fingers. The air was difficult to breathe, thick with the odors of rotten plants and minerals centuries old. After several minutes of crawling, his hands and knees were beginning to feel scraped and rough, and he slowly stood up, keeping a hand above his head in case the unseen ceiling was low. He was somewhat surprised to feel that there seemed to be no ceiling whatsoever. Standing straight up and reaching his hand as high as he could, he felt nothing but air, and yet he still felt smothered by the dimness and the earthen smells clogging his nose and mouth.

He froze as he thought he heard… something. His eyes as wide as they would go, he strained to see anything at all, but all he could see was blackness. Even his hand when held up in front of his nose was completely invisible, and the silence surrounding him seemed infinite.

…Until that. There was a definite rustle coming from somewhere behind him.

Not even waiting to see what was creating the sound, Kurt ran blindly with his hands out in front of him, his heart knocking violently against his ribcage. And then, out of nowhere, he collided with a wall of soil and rock and fell back onto his rear end, bits of dirt coating his tongue. He coughed, trying to get the dust out of his throat, and realized that he was crying, tears streaming down his face. Pulling himself to his knees, he sat back against the wall, trying to catch his breath.

There was another louder rustle from somewhere beyond the shadows, followed by crunching gravel, and the sound was getting closer. His mind began to imagine all sorts creatures both big and small that might be lurking not even three feet from him, just waiting to strike.

Kurt was going to die.

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><p><strong>AN: I know, this is VERY confusing, but hey, it's just the prologue. There's a lot more to come. Please review!**


	2. Anthill

_Rabbit Hole_

Angus Mills had been caretaker of the Weeping Willows Cemetery on the edge of Lima for the last sixty years, and assistant caretaker for ten years before that. At eighty-seven, he was riddled with arthritis and walked slowly with a stoop and a slight limp left over from falling into an open grave in the middle of the night during the summer of 1951. His assistant caretaker (whom he'd resisted hiring in an attempt to deny his old age, but had proven to be quite helpful), was a twenty-year-old boy called Neil who had only taken the job because of a morbid fascination with dead people. Since he'd hired Neil two years ago, Angus had repeatedly poked fun at the fact that Neil constantly wore black complimented with oddly-placed studs or chains, and every few months he'd show up with a new piercing. They looked rather unusual during their nightly patrols, a skinny kid with a lop-sided haircut and a ring through his nose walking next to an old man with a cane and a sweater vest.

On this particular night, Angus and Neil made their way along the winding footpath through the cemetery on their three A.M. patrol. Since neither man was at all aware of any activity happening _below_ the surface of the earth, and were reasonably confident that there was no activity happening above the surface either, only Neil had his flashlight turned on, letting Angus's failing octogenarian eyes take a rest. Walking slowly to allow Angus to keep up, the two caretakers made their way gradually up the path towards the graveyard's prized willow tree, which was hunched over the crest of a small hill, it's long branches forming a swaying curtain around the oldest family plot in the cemetery.

"I ever tell you who planted this tree?" Angus asked as the beam of Neil's flashlight ran over the medium-sized monuments around the tree's roots.

"The woman who's under the smallest marker," Neil recited, familiar with the story. "You told me at least fifty times, Gramps."

Angus nodded. "Ah." He flapped a hand. "Don't pay any attention to me, my memory ain't what it used to be." He adjusted his cap over his ears, then stopped where he was, alert.

"Mr. Mills?" Neil said, noticing that his mentor had frozen. "You're not having a stroke, are you?"

Angus looked around, his wrinkled forehead wrinkled even further in confusion. "My memory might be bad, but my hearing's as good as a deer's," he said, punching the soil next to his feet a few times with the butt of his cane, as if testing to make sure it was solid. "Neil, you studied geography in school, didn't you? Is Ohio on a fault line?"

"A what?"

"Someplace where there's a lot of earthquakes, son."

"Oh, uh… no. Why?"

Angus's cane punched the ground again. "Well, because—"

Whatever the old man had been about to say was lost, though, as the soil suddenly gave way beneath his feet, the earth opening up like the mouth of some gigantic beast. Angus let out a startled cry as he tumbled into the black void below, rocks and dirt crunching as they followed after him.

"Aaaugh!" Neil yelped, leaping backwards as the hole opened wider. He barely managed to keep his grip on the flashlight as he clung to the trunk of the willow tree.

After only a moment, it was quiet again. There was now a sinkhole fifteen feet wide where Angus had been standing.

"M-Mr. Mills?" Neil called out, letting go of the tree and edging towards the hole, afraid that the ground would give out again. But he made it to the lip of the crater without incident, and hesitantly peered down into the pit. "Mr. Mills?" he called again, aiming the beam of his flashlight down.

"I'm right here, son," Angus's voice came from somewhere below. The flashlight beam finally found him on the floor twenty feet below where Neil was standing, covered in dirt but alive.

"A-are you okay?"

"I'm shaken and I think I've broken my hip, but I'm otherwise intact. Apparently, we have a very serious ant problem."

"You think _ants_ did this?"

Angus chuckled, then coughed. "It's called making a joke, son, you should try it sometime. Now, we've got to figure out how to get me out of here." Neil made a move to try to climb down, but Angus waved a hand. "No, no, don't come down. I don't think there's a way to climb back up. Best you stay up there and hoist me up with some rope. If you just toss down one end, I can tie it around myself."

"Rope?" Neil echoed. "Do we have rope?"

"Sure. I've got plenty in the warehouse. Those machines they got for lowering the coffins malfunction a lot more than you would think."

Neil nodded, still unsettled. "O-okay, I'll run and get it."

"Toss me the flashlight first, will you, son? The dark is not my friend."

Neil ran back to the warehouse on the edge of the graveyard as fast as his legs would carry him. It had been a long time since he'd gotten over his uneasiness from being in a cemetery at night, but now it was renewed. In the warehouse, he found several sheets of rope on hooks in the back of the room and slung one over his shoulder, pocketing an extra flashlight as he rushed back out.

Back at the sinkhole, Neil dropped the flashlight on the ground and pulled one end of the rope around the willow trunk, tying it firmly, then dropping the rest of it down the hole. "Mr. Mills?" he called, noticing that the hole was completely dark again. The flashlight he'd given to Angus wasn't on. "Mr. Mills?"

Switching on his replacement flashlight, Neil aimed it down into the sinkhole, half expecting to see his mentor dead from a heart attack.

But Angus wasn't there. Only the flashlight lay on the dirt, not just broken, but _crushed_.

"Mr. Mills?" Neil yelled, beginning to panic. "Mr. Mills!"

He stood up, fishing his cell phone out of his back pocket, berating himself for not calling the police right away, and punched in 9-1-1. No sooner had he lifted the phone to his ear when the soil broke apart around his feet, two absolutely _massive_ hands bursting upwards and sinking claws the size of kitchen knives into his lower torso. Neil was barely able to scream before he was sucked into the earth.

* * *

><p>"Good morning, Short Stack," Kurt said cheerily as Blaine jumped into the passenger seat of the Navigator, hefting his book bag onto his lap.<p>

"Har har," Blaine replied, rubbing his hands together to warm them up. "You're turning into Sue Sylvester."

"That's not my fault. I was forever scarred from my time in the Cheerios."

Blaine grinned. "Hot," he said, leaning in for a kiss.

"Uh, no offence dudes, but could you take the P out of PDA?" asked Finn from where he was squeezed into the back seat.

Kurt winked at his boyfriend. "We'll finish this later."

"Ew," said Finn. "And I mean that in a totally non-homophobic way," he added quickly, his eyes widening for a second.

Kurt rolled his eyes as he guided the car back onto the road, heading for McKinley on the other side of town. "We know what you meant, Finn. Relax. You're going to pop a wingnut one of these days, and you need all the wingnuts you have."

"I don't know what that means." Before either boy in front could answer, Finn piped up with a new question. "So, what are you guys dressing up as for Halloween?"

Kurt hummed a little. "I was toying with the idea of Lindsay Lohan fresh out of rehab, but I finally settled on zombie Tim Gunn."

"Lindsay Lohan's way scarier," said Blaine.

"True, but I rock the zombie look."

"Who's Tim Gunn?"

Kurt had to grip the steering wheel tightly to suppress the urge to turn around and smack his stepbrother.

"Well, _I'm_ going as Jack Skellington," Blaine interjected. "Tim Burton is a god."

"Ooh, maybe I should be Beetlejuice, then, so our costumes are somewhat coordinated."

"I think a zombie would go with anything Burton, whether or not it's a fashion tycoon," Blaine grinned. "Besides, the Beetlejuice voice would sound freaky coming from you."

"That's kind of the point."

"What about you, Finn?"

"I haven't thought of anything good yet."

"Finn!" Kurt shrieked. "Halloween is _three days_ away and you haven't thought of _anything_?"

Finn flinched, despite being more than familiar with Kurt Hummel Hissy Fits®.

Blaine came to his rescue, squeezing Kurt's shoulder as he said, "Why don't the three of us meet at my house this afternoon and try to work something out for you?"

Finn relaxed immediately, sending Blaine a grateful look. "Yeah, that'd be cool."

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><p>What was supposed to be Kurt and Blaine helping Finn with his costume ended up turning into more of a Kurt-does-everything-while-the-lazy-people-kick-back-and-talk-about-football situation. After Kurt had forced Finn to choose between Willy Wonka, Pugsley Addams, and Sweeney Todd, Blaine and Finn lounged about in Blaine's room while Kurt dug through the items that they had borrowed from Mr. Anderson's wardrobe (Blaine's father was even taller than Finn and just as broad).<p>

"Here we are, Finn," Kurt said, pulling out a long brownish-grey waistcoat and tossing it to his stepbrother, who yelped indignantly when the garment him in the face. "Try that on."

Finn rubbed his nose where it had been clipped by one of the buttons and stood up, pulling the waistcoat on over the white dress shirt and tight-ish black pants he already had on (the pants they'd actually gotten from a thrift store on the way to Blaine's house after school). He tugged at the collar of his shirt as he studied his reflection in Blaine's full-length mirror. "I dunno, Kurt, this looks weird."

"That's because it's not done yet. We still need to do your hair and makeup. And find you a good pair of black shoes."

Finn grimaced. "Why do I need makeup?"

"Because you need to look evil and as intimidating as you can be when you're angry, you're too much of a puppy to pull off evil."

Finn opened his mouth to retort, but an urgent shout from downstairs cut him off. "_Blaine! I need you in the cellar right away!_" yelled Blaine's father.

Blaine immediately tensed, and Kurt frowned at the slight movement. His boyfriend wasn't usually one to panic over things – at least not outwardly – but what Kurt saw in the split second before Blaine stood up, his face once again blank, was definitely panic with a side of dread.

"Uh, you guys can show yourselves out, right?" Blaine said, his voice tight. He swallowed, not-so-discreetly wiping his hand on his pant leg before grabbing the doorknob. "I'll see you tomorrow morning."

Kurt watched his boyfriend disappear downstairs, feeling uneasy for some reason. It wasn't the first time Blaine's dad had suddenly called him down to the basement, but it had never sounded urgent before and Blaine had never been quite so nervous about it. There had been a few times that he'd seemed a little reluctant, but Kurt had always assumed that it was because Blaine would rather hang out with his (admittedly awesome) boyfriend instead of helping his dad out with…whatever they were doing.

"Do they have a gym down there?" Finn's voice cut through Kurt's train of thought.

"Huh?"

"In the basement. Do they have like a home gym or something? It sounded like his dad was hurt or something. Maybe he fell off the treadmill."

"They don't have a gym."

"Well, should we see if they need help?"

Kurt had no idea what Blaine and his father were up to in the basement – he'd been down there more than once and there didn't seem to be much there, aside from a few old boxes and pieces of furniture – but whatever it was, it had to be private, otherwise Blaine would have told him about it.

But that look on Blaine's face… That was cause for concern.

Sighing and resolving to talk to Blaine about it later, Kurt turned back to the pile of clothing on the floor. "Come on, let's get this cleaned up."

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><p><strong>AN: Please leave a review and tell me what you think.**


	3. Mimsy Borogroves

**A/N: Ack, I'm so sorry for the delay here. My muse has ADHD and was a little too absorbed in a few of my other stories, as well as my coffee stash.  
><strong>

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><p><em>Rabbit Hole<em>

Kurt and Finn got to school late the next morning (because _someone_ was more interested in finishing a level of Call Of Duty and making everyone else wait than actually being responsible), so Kurt wasn't able to see Blaine until lunchtime, when he plopped down at the glee club's usual table with his tray. Blaine had study hall right before lunch, so he'd arrived early and was the only other person at the table (the rest of the student body was slowly making its way along the buffet lines).

"You look tired," Kurt said as he stabbed a lettuce leaf with his fork.

Blaine blinked, then shrugged. "Long night," he replied, rubbing at the slight circles under his eyes.

"Doing what?"

Blaine's eyebrows snapped together. "Why?" he asked, a little too sharply.

Kurt paused. "It was just a question, Blaine."

"Oh." Blaine sighed. "I'm sorry, Kurt, I've just been stretched kind of thin this past week. Haven't had much sleep." As if to prove his point, Blaine yawned widely.

Kurt chewed his salad thoughtfully for a few moments, studying his boyfriend. Blaine's eyes were blearier than usual, even just counting the past week, and he didn't seem to be that interested in his food (which really wasn't that appetizing, but still). As Blaine reached up and rubbed his eyes again, Kurt noticed that there were thick lines of dirt underneath his fingernails – gross, yes, but more of a cause for concern than anything else. When it came to hygiene, Blaine was just as fastidious as Kurt. Ignoring even the slightest detail was a clear sign that he had something worrying on his mind.

"Blaine, is everything okay?" Kurt inquired.

Blaine almost seemed like he didn't hear the question, and responded with an absentminded, "Yeah, sure."

"I mean… at home," Kurt clarified gently, remembering the look of panic on Blaine's face the day before. "With your dad."

His face contorting into a frown as he tried to evaluate what Kurt was getting at, Blaine hesitated before replying. "…Yes," he said slowly. "Why do you ask?"

Kurt put down his fork, keeping an eye on the other glee members currently in line at the buffet. He wanted to get this over with before anyone else sat down. "It's just that yesterday, you seemed, well… _scared_ of him," he explained, trying to show Blaine that he was only concerned for his boyfriend's health.

Blaine watched him for a second. "Oh, that!" he said suddenly, his forehead abruptly smoothing out as if he'd slipped on a mask of placidity. "He asks me to help him with his projects and I don't like being in the basement is all. I'm a little claustrophobic."

"Oh," Kurt said. He could easily see that Blaine was lying, but he couldn't for the life of him figure out _why_, or what secrets Blaine could be wanting to keep so badly. "Well, you should talk to him about that."

The conversation was pushed off the table as Finn and Rachel approached with their lunches and sat down, Rachel immediately pulling Blaine into a discussion of their performance numbers for the next competition.

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><p>After school, Kurt ran home to grab his Halloween costume before heading over to Blaine's, since their plan for the afternoon was to meet up at the Andersons' to help each other with their costume makeup (Blaine was apparently something of an expert at making something look decomposed, which was essential for Kurt's zombified Tim Gunn). Pulling his Navigator in to park at the top of the Andersons' steeply sloped driveway, Kurt hopped out with the bag containing his costume in hand and jogged up onto the front porch.<p>

He was about to ring the doorbell, but noise from inside the house made him stop in his tracks, just outside the door. It was definitely shouting, but it was hard to tell at first who was doing the yelling. Kurt swallowed when he was able to make out the words and he realized that it was Blaine's voice.

"—Don't you get it, Dad? _I don't want to do it any more!_" Blaine yelled. There was the sound of something made of glass smashing into pieces against a wall or a floor, and Kurt's heart plummeted. He'd never known Blaine to be the violently angry type.

Mr. Anderson's voice cut in, not quite shouting but still loud enough for Kurt to hear. "I _get_ that you've got your sights set on going to New York and singing and dancing for the rest of your life, but it's _childish_, Blaine! And you are not a little boy any more!"

"No, you _don't _get it!" Blaine shouted back. "This has got absolutely _nothing_ to do with my wanting to become a performer!"

"Maybe we should take you out of school," Mr. Anderson continued, ignoring his son. "I need you around here more now that we know there's an entire den nearby—"

"_NO!_" Blaine bellowed. Kurt flinched. "For God's sake, Dad, _this isn't normal!_"

"What do you mean? Of course it's normal," Mr. Anderson argued. "Just because most people are none the wiser doesn't make it abnormal."

"That's the _definition_ of abnormal!" Blaine cried, exasperated. "When I was eight I told you I was scared of the dark, and you gave me a shotgun! How the hell does that fit in with 'normal'? Huh? Where does that fall on the spectrum?"

"Blaine, there are more important things at stake here than—"

"No, there _aren't_! I want to spend my time going out with friends, doing my homework, going to school, and having a relationship with my boyfriend that _isn't_ full of lies! I _don't_ want to spend it cutting up corpses in the basement!"

At that moment, any other verbal blows that might have been further exchanged between Blaine and his father were nothing more than muffled buzzing sounds to Kurt's ears. His head was spinning and he wasn't entirely sure that the floor beneath his feet was still there. His body taking on a mind of its own, Kurt turned and strode quickly through a haze back to his car. He made sure not to turn on the engine until he had coasted back onto the road.

Ten minutes later, Kurt's phone rang on the seat beside him.

"_Hey, Kurt, are you still coming over?_"

All traces of stress had been wiped from Blaine's voice. How much had Blaine kept hidden? How much had Kurt ignored?

"Sorry," he said, feeling as though his mouth was speaking of its own accord. "Something came up."

"_All right. See you tomorrow, then._"

Click.

Kurt dropped the phone onto the passenger seat and turned his eyes back to the road in front of him, wondering if Blaine found it easier to lie.

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><p>"Well?" Robert Anderson prompted as Blaine ended the call. They were in the dining room, the tension from their fight still stretching the air between them.<p>

Blaine sighed. "He's not coming."

"Good. Then you're free." Robert stood up from his seat at the dining table, pulling off his vest and draping it over the back of his chair, then unbuttoning his cuffs and rolling up his sleeves.

"No."

"I'm sorry?"

Blaine didn't meet his father's eye. "I have homework to do."

Robert planted his hands on his hips. "School can wait. I need the scalpels and hacksaws cleaned by five o'clock."


	4. Jabberwocky

_Rabbit Hole  
><em>

The next evening, Kurt adjusted his coat and studied his reflection in the full-length mirror in the corner of his bedroom. Since he'd lied his way out of his makeup-practice session with Blaine, he'd had to make do with his own skills in the department. Smudges of green and white and yellow and black over every inch of exposed skin thoroughly made him look deathly ill, at least, so he supposed it wasn't a total waste of oddly-colored foundations. He'd brushed his cheap tuxedo over with dust and a few patches of oil from the tire shop (giving the cloth a stiffer look in some spots). The left sleeve and right pant leg had both been torn off, leaving a threadbare and jagged edge behind. Finally, he'd brushed egg whites and flour into his hair to give it a dirty, greyish and unkempt appearance.

All afternoon, he'd been grateful for the distraction of getting his costume ready, but now that it was finished, Kurt found that he was dreading the Halloween party at Blaine's house. He'd managed during the school day to keep busy enough so that he'd only had to see Blaine at lunch, and during the lunch period he'd been _so_ grateful that Rachel was intent on getting hair advice from him for her costume, providing the perfect excuse to avoid talking to his boyfriend.

There was a knock on the door, and Finn stuck his head in. "Hey, dude, we gotta go. It's almost— _Whoa_, you look awesome."

Kurt smiled, turning around. "Thanks. You too."

Finn tugged at the white streak in his hair. "Did we really have to dye my hair for this?"

"Yes."

"It looks _weird._"

"That's the point, you lummox," Kurt said, affectionately rolling his eyes. "And stop whining – it doesn't suit a serial killer. Now, come on. You're driving."

Finn's eyebrows shot up. "You're letting me drive?"

Kurt gave him a look as he passed by through the door. "Zombies can't drive, Mr. Todd."

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><p>Blaine's house was already crowded when Finn and Kurt arrived, and <em>The Complete Works of Danny Elfman<em> was blasting from the stereo system in the living room, currently playing the opening theme to _Beetlejuice_. As soon as they walked in the door, they were ambushed by Rachel and Mercedes.

"Oh my god, you look _amazing_," Rachel said, staring at Kurt's mottled skin. She was wearing faded cutoff jeans, brightly striped stockings that didn't match, and a plaid checkered button-down shirt, and she'd painted freckles scattered over her nose and cheeks. Her hair had been braided around two wires (Kurt's idea) to make the pigtails stick straight out.

"And you could put an eye out," Kurt grinned, tugging playfully at her hair. She batted his hand away.

"I can't believe you let her dress up like Pippi Longstocking," Mercedes snapped, adjusting her Red Riding Hood cloak on her shoulders. "She jabbed me in the neck earlier and I swear to God, I thought she ruptured an artery."

"Don't be jealous of my awesome costume," Rachel said.

"Oh, please, you _wish _you had my sexy getup."

"All right, all right, do we need to settle this in a diva-off?" Kurt cut in, overly familiar with the position of referee where Mercedes and Rachel were concerned. "Where's Blaine?"

Rachel jerked a thumb over her shoulder. "Everyone's in the living room. There's a bunch of Warblers here, too, so no talking about our set list for Sectionals!" She sent a pointed warning glance in Finn's direction.

"Relax," Kurt said. "And don't worry – if any of the Warblers find out our secrets, Finn's got a razorblade you can use."

The four of them joined the main party in the living room, which had been decorated with spider webs and hanging bats, as well as paper jack-o-lanterns dangling from the ceiling. Blaine, disguised as Jack Skellington, was over by the stereo, dancing with Jeff and Nick, who were dressed up as Justin Timberlake and JC Chasez.

Kurt hesitated, not really sure if he wanted to talk to Blaine just yet. After a full day of replaying the argument he'd overheard between Blaine and his father over and over and over again, Kurt wasn't even entirely sure of what he'd heard at all. Blaine wanted to be a performer – maybe Mr. Anderson had been helping him rehearse the script for something. Or maybe Kurt had just misheard their words – after all, Kurt had been outside the house and listening through at least one wall.

Still, he couldn't shake the nagging feeling at the back of his mind that Blaine was lying about something very serious.

Too late now, though, as Blaine had spotted him and was making his way over. "Kurt, you look great," he said, the painted skeletal smile over his mouth and cheeks bending as he smiled for real.

"You too," Kurt replied automatically. He hoped that the makeup caked on his face would be enough to hide his unexplained reservations.

"You want something to drink?"

"I don't suppose you've got a brain smoothie?"

"Fresh out of brains, Mr. Gunn, sorry," Blaine grinned, his teeth contrasting creepily with the paint on his face. Kurt tried and failed to suppress a chill running up his spine.

"R-Right," he stammered, having already forgotten about his halfhearted attempt at undead humor. "Diet soda, then. Thanks."

Blaine nodded and disappeared into the kitchen.

Kurt watched the other kids for a few moments and then, completely uncertain of what was propelling him to do so, ducked out of the room unnoticed by the rest of the partygoers. He snuck past the kitchen, making sure that Blaine didn't see him (which wasn't hard, since Blaine had his back to the door), and stole into the corridor beyond.

_What-am-I-doing-what-am-I-doing-oh-my-god-what-am-I-doing_, repeated in his head, but inexplicably and fully against his instincts, he grabbed the handle of the basement door. He knew for a fact that Blaine's parents were not home – they had left the house to Blaine for the party – so there was no chance he'd accidentally disturb Mr. Anderson (he hoped, anyway – maybe that had been a lie as well and Blaine's father was just hiding out in the basement, conducting his projects). Before he could panic and back out, Kurt pulled the door open and descended the stairs.

There was nothing.

The basement looked exactly as it had the last time Kurt had been down here (he'd been running from Blaine, who at the time had been armed with a spoonful of cookie dough and was threatening to rub it into Kurt's hair). Kurt stood in the center of the room, having no idea of what he was looking for. The room wasn't that large, considering how big Blaine's house was, but there was enough room for a few old pieces of discarded furniture, covered in old sheets and collecting dust. There was a tiny window just above the ground level, nearly at the cellar's ceiling, and the diminishing evening light was giving the room an odd orange-ish glow.

Kurt sighed, shivering in the slight chill. He'd been wrong.

Now, the only problem was convincing himself of that.

As he turned to leave, however, the floor creaked beneath his feet. He stopped, looking down at the ratty old rug he was standing on. The rest of the floor was clearly stone – it was an old house, and the foundation had been laid more than two hundred years ago according to Blaine – so it shouldn't have made any sounds at all. Bending down with his blood roaring in his ears, Kurt grabbed a corner of the dusty carpet and lifted it.

A wooden door was set into the stone. Leading down.

"Hello? Is someone down here?"

Kurt's head snapped up, and he quickly pulled the rug back over the door. Standing back up, he hopped up the stairs. "Hi, Blaine, sorry. Dropped my cufflink and it rolled down the stairs. I found it, though."

Blaine blinked at him, startled by Kurt's rushed talking. "Oh," he said. "That's okay. I just—" His mouth twitched. "Never mind. Let's head back."

Kurt nodded and turned back towards the party, hearing Blaine shut the basement door behind him. For the rest of the night, Kurt could feel Blaine's eyes on him, and for the first time, it didn't make him feel good.

* * *

><p>Halloween ended, days passed, and Kurt and Blaine gradually regained some semblance of comfort in each other's space. While they were able to make small talk and poke fun at one another just as they'd done before, there was constantly a layer of unease surrounding their conversations that they both ignored. Even Finn asked Kurt if the two of them were fighting about something. Mercedes and Rachel picked up on the strain in their relationship as well, and though the both of them kept quiet about it, Kurt was sure that they were talking behind his back.<p>

Or maybe he was just paranoid.

The problem was that Kurt really had no idea what the hell he was supposed to do, or even if this problem really existed. There was a lot of evidence that could be provided to support it being entirely his imagination – for example, the fact that Blaine's house was old and probably had all sorts of nooks and crannies that even Mr. Anderson had no idea existed. The trap door in the cellar didn't necessarily have any significance whatsoever.

Kurt knew what his options were. He could call the police, talk to Blaine, or investigate on his own. Unfortunately, there was a major problem to accompany each potential solution.

If he called the police and there turned out to be nothing, not only would he be in trouble with the law, but his relationship with Blaine would also become even more stressed than it already was. Talking to Blaine about it posed risks on several different levels – not the least of which was that Kurt wasn't really sure if his own safety was at stake here. And lastly, investigating on his own was both scary and difficult to manage, considering that the trap door was located in Blaine's house.

However, if he could pull it off… If he could make absolute _sure_ that this was just his imagination running wild… There would be no harm done to their relationship. It was the safest option.

So, on an afternoon in the middle of November, Kurt 'accidentally' forgot his textbooks at Blaine's house, and called Blaine up the next day – a Saturday – to ask if he could stop by to get it. Blaine informed him that he and his parents were going to a community theater production of _Fiddler On The Roof_ in Wapakoneta and wouldn't be back until the early afternoon, but Kurt was welcome to run into the house when they weren't there to retrieve the book.

Kurt parked in Blaine's empty driveway around eleven in the morning and pulled the spare key out from under the flowerpot on the front porch. He found his textbook on the dining room table, dropped it into his book bag and left the bag on one of the chairs. Heading down the hallway past the kitchen, he opened the basement door and descended the stairs. He'd hoped that maybe he'd imagined the trap door, but it was still there, lying shut beneath the dirty carpet.

Taking a deep breath, Kurt grabbed the rope handle and hoisted the door open, letting it fall back with a solid _thunk_ and a squeal of the hinges. The only thing he could see was a ladder (obviously well-used), sinking into the dimness beneath it. Kurt had never been claustrophobic, but staring down the hole in Blaine's basement floor, he suddenly realized exactly why a small dark space would make someone afraid.

Kurt swallowed, taking several breaths to try to steady his nerves before lowering one foot into the hole. He climbed down, one rung to the next, until his shoe scraped the floor. The light coming down through the tiny window in the cellar up above was enough for Kurt to make out a small hanging light bulb over his head, with a string dangling beside it. He switched the bulb on, and drew a sharp breath.

He should have called the police.

The room was very small, and empty aside from a single tool chest squatting off to the side, and a rack full of at least ten different kinds of guns. Handguns, pistols, shotguns, rifles… a crossbow. Kurt gulped, feeling dust coating his throat.

In the wall opposite the gun rack, there was yet another door. This one appeared to be a normal door – the same height and width as any of the doors upstairs – but it was old, and the wood was flaking. If he had fully absorbed the fact that there were _weapons_ hidden in his boyfriend's basement, he wouldn't have even considered opening the door, but as it was, Kurt was running on autopilot and the curiosity in his brain seemed to be stronger than his instincts.

The door wasn't locked, and behind it there was a steep staircase reaching further downwards. This time, Kurt didn't have to search for the light switch – it was on the wall just inside the door, and when he flipped it there was a low buzz as a few fluorescents whirred to life down below.

As Kurt slowly crept down the stairs, he tried to ignore the smells that were beginning to clog his nose. Dirt. Old blood and bile. Something chemical and acidic that burned his sinuses. At this point he wasn't sure how far below ground level he was, and he tried not to think about it.

At the bottom of the stairs, Kurt froze, his breath trapped in his chest.

He was standing in front of a large table made of polished steel, like the kind used in morgues for autopsies. But it was _huge_ – nine feet long and at least five feet wide and Kurt couldn't help but wonder how many people could fit onto it at once.

Fighting the urge to vomit, Kurt tore his eyes away from the table and took in the rest of his surroundings. This room was much bigger than the two above it – the metal table occupied only a small part of it. On the wall behind the table was a massive rack filled with tools that ranged from simple handheld screwdrivers to well-worn hacksaws and oddly shaped cleavers. To Kurt's right there was a worktable attached to the wall, covered in a disorganized array of tools and pieces of equipment that Kurt didn't want to know the purposes of.

To his left, on the other side of the metal table, there were rows of shelves stretching on to the very back of the room. Each shelf block contained _hundreds_ of jars, ranging in size from no taller than Kurt's thumb to bigger than his head, all of them filled with greenish liquid and preserved parts of—

Kurt looked away, feeling bile rise in his throat. He needed to get out of here. He need to get out, get away, and call the police. As panic began to tug at the ends of his nerves, Kurt turned, about to run back up the stairs and up to where the air was cleaner.

And a voice stopped him.

"Blaine, are you down there?"

Kurt stopped short, his heart catapulting into his mouth. Mr. Anderson's voice had been muffled – he had to be standing at the door to the first floor hallway. Kurt's body was now in full fight-or-flight mode, but he knew that if Blaine's father was up there, there was absolutely no way he'd be able to get out without being seen.

His brain made the decision for him, and as Mr. Anderson's footsteps descended the ladder in the room above, Kurt ran and crouched behind one of the shelves.

"Blaine?" Mr. Anderson called from the top of the stairs, the steps creaking loudly under his feet.

Kurt clamped his hands over his mouth and nose, praying that Mr. Anderson wouldn't hear him breathing. He watched, peering out from between a jar containing a mutated deer fetus and another holding what looked vaguely like a swollen human hand, as Mr. Anderson glanced around the room in confusion.

"Hello?" he called.

After a few moments that _had_ to be the most frightening seconds of Kurt's life, Mr. Anderson shook his head and turned around, muttering to himself about Blaine leaving all the doors open. He grabbed an apron from the rack by the stairs and tied it around his waist, completely unperturbed by the fact that it was smeared with dried blood and other substances that Kurt didn't want to recognize.

As Mr. Anderson set about working on something small-scale on the worktable (Kurt was grateful that he couldn't see exactly what, but it looked like a dissection of some sort), Kurt wildly looked for a way out. He couldn't make it to the door at the top of the stairs, and he couldn't risk just staying where he was and hoping Mr. Anderson would leave soon and give Kurt a chance to get out of the house through the front door.

When he spotted the tiny door set into the wall at the back of the room, Kurt decided that it had to be a miracle.

He watched Mr. Anderson work for a minute before mustering up the courage to start crawling towards the door. He made it to the second-closest shelf block, then paused to look back and make sure that Mr. Anderson was still absorbed in his work.

Kurt didn't realize he'd knocked a jar off of the lowest shelf until after the glass had shattered and the formaldehyde had splashed over his hands. Mr. Anderson whipped around, a pistol that had been sitting on the worktable held cocked in his hand.

"Who's there!" he demanded.

Kurt wouldn't have replied if he could, but his hands were burning and his eyes watering as the pungent odor of the preservative chemical was wafting up from the puddle around his feet and knees. He was desperately trying not to vomit, but it was a losing battle.

Allowing his reflexes to take over completely, he rolled to his feet and made a run for the small door, flinching as the gun fired and several of the jars on the nearest shelf exploded. A flying shard of glass ripped through the skin on his cheek as a second bullet whistled past his ear and embedded itself in the wall.

Kurt wrapped his hands around the rusted door handle just as a third shot missed his shoulder by a mere two inches. He yanked and tugged at the door, but it hadn't been used in years and the hinges weren't about to give easily.

At the exact same moment as the fourth shot roared through the air, Kurt finally managed to pull the door open. Without hesitation, he launched himself through the small-ish opening and wrenched the door shut behind him, disappearing into the dark.

* * *

><p>Blaine returned from Wapakoneta with his mother to find Kurt's Navigator parked at the top of the driveway. Paula Anderson frowned in the passenger seat.<p>

"Oh, are you and Kurt hanging out this afternoon?" she asked as she stepped out of the car, pulling her purse over her shoulder.

"Not that I'm aware," Blaine shrugged. "He said he wanted to stop by to pick up his books, though."

"Well, if you are hanging out, don't let it go too long, all right? Your father needs you to work in a couple hours," she reminded him.

Blaine sighed as he climbed up the porch steps. "Mom, I don't understand why I _have_ to do this stuff."

She stopped in front of the door, squeezing his arm affectionately. She was even shorter than he was. "Oh, honey. I know you don't enjoy it, but Cooper's not exactly available, and frankly, Dad finds it hard to relate to you. He just wants time with you before you're off to college."

"He can't relate to me because he's a _butcher_," Blaine snapped.

"Stop it," his mother said forcefully, making Blaine instantly recoil. "You know as well as I do that your father is doing this because it keeps people safe. If you choose not to accept that, that's up to you."

Blaine exhaled heavily. "Sorry," he mumbled.

"It's just two more years, honey." Paula patted his shoulder, opening the front door and entering the house ahead of him.

As Paula went into the kitchen, Blaine hung his jacket and scarf up on the coat rack by the door. "Kurt?" he called over his shoulder, seeing Kurt's book bag on one of the dining room chairs.

Rather than Kurt's voice, Robert Anderson spoke up from the front hall. "Blaine," he said, making his son turn around. "There's someone in the warren."

It took less than a second for the color to completely drain from Blaine's face. "What? Who?" It was a pointless question, though; Blaine knew who it was, though he had _no_ idea how Kurt could have possibly found out about the sub-basement, let alone gone down there.

"I don't know," said Robert. "I didn't get a clear look at his face."

"Well, what happened?" Blaine demanded.

Robert threw his hands up. "He must have broken into the house. I caught him snooping around downstairs and he made a run for it – got out through the old door to the tunnels."

Blaine's eyes widened. "And you didn't go after him?"

"He's not a problem any more." Something out the window caught Robert's attention, and he frowned. "Blaine, why is Kurt's car here?"

Blaine stared at him. "You're not serious, are you?"

Robert's face hardened into an expression that Blaine was all too familiar with. "You know as well as I do that he's got absolutely no chance now that he's in the warren," he said lowly. "Especially now that we know there's an entire den nearby."

Blaine ran a hand over his face. "Oh my God, you are serious."

Robert continued as if Blaine hadn't spoken. "The alpha's going to sniff him out before long, and then we can get back to our work without having to worry about someone going to the authorities. We can't have the outside breathing down our necks."

"It's _your_ work, not ours!" Blaine cried, storming down the hall towards the cellar door.

Paula poked her head out of the kitchen. "What's going on, dear?"

"Kurt's in the warren," he snapped as he passed by.

"What?" Robert said. His eyes widened and he glanced back out the window, at Kurt's car in the driveway. "Oh—" He rushed after his son, heading down the stairs and catching up with Blaine at the trap door.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

Blaine huffed as he descended the ladder. "I'm going after him. He doesn't have _any_ clue what he's up against."

Robert quickly climbed down after him. "You can't," he said.

"Yes, Dad, I can." Blaine was standing at the gun rack, pocketing his personal handgun and slinging a rifle over his shoulder as well. He grabbed a kerosene lantern from next to the tool chest.

"No, Blaine—" Robert stepped in front of the door.

Blaine's jaw clenched. "Get out of my way."

"Blaine, you can't go after him. It's too dangerous."

"I know! That's why I'm going! Kurt deserves better!" Blaine shouted, his voice reverberating in the tiny room.

Robert swallowed. "Blaine, we already lost your brother in that warren. I don't want to—"

"Dad, Cooper suffered," Blaine said pleadingly. "He _suffered_. I'm not about to let that happen to Kurt. I can't."

Not allowing his father to debate him any more, Blaine shoved past him and down the stairs. He pocketed a box of matches off of Robert's worktable as he passed by, and when he approached the old little door at the back of the room, his heart wrenched at the sight of the bullet holes in the wall surrounding it.

Taking a deep breath, Blaine pried the door open and crawled through, allowing himself to be swallowed whole by the shadows.


	5. Lumos

_Rabbit Hole_

Kurt ran blindly, feeling his way along the dirt walls. The dark was so thick that his lungs felt filled with _black_, and the tunnels twisted and turned in such a complicated pattern that within five minutes of leaving the basement behind, he was completely and utterly lost. He couldn't tell if he was going in circles or a zigzag or if the tunnel branched out at all. All he knew was that it was dark and cold and dirty. His nostrils were clogged with the smell of decomposition – plants, animals, rocks, soil… _Age_.

His breath was coming short, and he knew he was running out of oxygen. The darkness felt tight against his skin.

Suddenly, there was the distinct sound of rocks and dirt shifting, as if disturbed by a large foot. The hairs on the back of Kurt's neck stood up, and he panicked. He let go of the wall and _ran_.

He only made it about twenty paces before he collided with the wall as the tunnel curved again, and he fell onto the floor, feeling the dampness in the loamy soil seep into his clothes. His palms, which were blistered from the formaldehyde that had spilled over them, scraped against the rocky dirt and made him cry out in pain.

Pulling himself back onto his knees, he leaned back against the tunnel wall and tried to keep his breathing steady and his hands from shaking. His face was wet, but he didn't know if the tears were from the compressed air or from sheer terror.

_Crunch_.

Kurt's head snapped up, his body tensed and his eyes as wide as he could make them. He tried to listen, not sure of what he'd heard or even if he'd heard anything, but all he could hear now was his heartbeat reverberating in his chest, so loudly that he was certain it could be heard throughout the entire tunnel.

He sucked in a huge breath, holding the putrid air in his lungs for several seconds as he tried to make himself stop shaking and _think_. The air down here held no traces of freshness, nor was there even the slightest movement. He was trapped – _oh God I'm going to die_ – and his imagination was running wild with images of mad scientists and preserved animals and body parts and tools caked with old blood – _I'm going to suffocate and no one will ever know _– and it was all because he was an idiot who let his curiosity get the better of him. He'd seen the movies. He knew how this worked. If someone accidentally discovered a secret that needed keeping, they were put down.

_Crunch._

Kurt pressed his hand over his mouth, hoping that whatever creature was in the tunnels wouldn't be able to hear him. Now, he could definitely make out the sound of footsteps, unevenly spaced but steady, growing louder from somewhere off in the darkness.

He tensed even further as, slowly, light began to filter through the air from around a bend in the tunnel, illuminating the walls and floor. Kurt realized fleetingly that the tunnel wasn't as large as he'd thought it was – it was only about seven feet wide and twelve feet to the ceiling.

But if there was light, then that meant it was a person. A human being.

_He's coming after me. Run run run run run run run RUN._

Kurt launched himself to his feet and tore away down the tunnel, away from the light that was still growing brighter. In his blind panic, he didn't see the sharp stone poking out of the dirt; his shoe caught against it and he tumbled, the floor sloping downwards into the earth.

He landed hard on his back as the floor evened out again, after rolling head over heels for at least ten yards, and felt the wind knocked out of his lungs. He struggled to breathe, not noticing that his gasps for air were easily audible.

The light reappeared from up the slope, making Kurt's pupils shrink to pinpoints and his retinas ache. He didn't move, finally accepting that he wouldn't be able to get away. He was lost, trapped underground, and unable to breathe. At this point, a gunshot to the head would be mercy, even if it was from Blaine's father.

"Kurt! Are you okay?"

Kurt froze as the light swung from side to side and the person holding it skidded down the bank, the rocks crunching underfoot. Suddenly Blaine was standing over him, reaching down to help him up, their faces illuminated by the kerosene lantern held in Blaine's hand.

The moment Kurt saw the rifle slung over Blaine's shoulder, he scrambled back. "Stay away from me!"

"What? Why?"

"Wh—" Kurt panted, out of breath and petrified. "_You have a gun!_"

"_Shh!_" Blaine whispered. "Keep your voice down – the gun is for _protection_. What on earth made you think I'd hurt you?"

"_YOU HAVE AN AUTOPSY TABLE IN YOUR BASEMENT!_" Kurt shouted, his voice sounding muffled even though he'd yelled at the top of his lungs.

"Not for _people!_" Blaine hissed, his eyes wide in the lamplight. "Now, be quiet! She might hear us!"

"Huh?"

Blaine sighed, glancing around the shadows, as if he was watching out for something. "Come on. I'll explain, but you have to be _quiet_. Or else we'll be food, and it won't be for the worms."

Too frightened to even ask what that meant, Kurt followed as Blaine began to walk further along the tunnel. The fact that Blaine seemed to know where he was going was almost more unsettling than anything else Kurt had seen or heard in the past few… minutes? hours? Being so far underground had distorted his sense of time. For all he knew, he'd been in the dark for a year.

They'd only walked about twenty yards before Blaine stopped and pulled another gun out of his belt and held it out to Kurt.

"You should have this one," he said, keeping his voice lowered.

Kurt held up his hands, shaking his head. "No," he said. "No, no, no, this is— This is too much, Blaine."

"Take the gun."

"_No!_"

"_SHH!_" Blaine's eyes were wide in the lamplight, his hazel irises turned a deep black. "Kurt, you—" he started, swallowing. "You need to take the gun."

Kurt wanted to protest, but something in Blaine's face made him stop. He realized that Blaine wasn't telling him to do anything – he was _begging_.

Blaine was terrified.

Kurt drew a long breath, then gingerly took the gun out of Blaine's hand. It was a small handgun, only about eight inches long, but that didn't make it look any less deadly. Blaine reached over and flicked a tiny switch on the side of the gun.

"There," he said. "Safety's off. If you see something, just point and shoot." He turned and continued walking in the other direction.

Kurt gulped, hurrying to catch up. "If I see what?"

Blaine didn't reply as the light from the lantern illuminated the tunnel up ahead, where it suddenly forked into two. The left tunnel led further down into the belly of the earth, while the right branched off and bent into the darkness, staying level. Blaine moved towards the left.

"Wait," Kurt said, grabbing Blaine's arm. "Don't we want that one?" He pointed to the right fork.

Something shifted in Blaine's face – sadness, maybe. Kurt couldn't quite put a finger on it. "No, we don't," Blaine said, then headed into the mouth of the left fork.

Kurt tried to keep his breathing steady as he followed Blaine into a tunnel that went God only knew how deep, but it was difficult to ignore the fear that was making each and every one of his nerve cells crackle with adrenaline.

"Blaine, what is going on?" he asked after a few minutes of tense silence broken only by their footsteps. "What is this place?"

Blaine continued to walk slightly ahead of Kurt, keeping his eyes focused on where they were going. "It's a warren," he said tightly.

"What does that mean?"

Blaine exhaled slowly, clearly not wanting to explain this. "A warren is a network of tunnels that animals live in. Rabbits dig them."

Kurt frowned, looking up at the twelve-foot-high ceiling. "Rabbits made this?"

"…No."

"Okay, Blaine, I'm _really_ freaked out, so any time you want to start giving me straightforward answers, that'd be great."

Blaine abruptly turned around to face Kurt, making the taller boy skid to a stop. "Kurt, I would love to explain all of this to you right now, but the only thing I can focus on at the moment is getting you and me out of here in one piece, all right? I'm very sorry that you're scared, but the fact is you _should_ be. So, until we get topside, I need you do me a favor, and shut the hell up."

Kurt's teeth clacked as his jaw snapped shut. He was caught completely off-guard – not just by Blaine's tone of voice but by his facial expression as well. Kurt had never seen Blaine this serious.

But still, he was the one who had just found a _morgue_ in Blaine's basement – Kurt was pretty sure that he wasn't the bad guy in this situation, and he said as much.

"I told you, that table is not for people," Blaine hissed. "Now _shut. up._"

Kurt swallowed his arguments, walked behind Blaine, and tried to keep his brain concentrated on remembering to breathe.


	6. A Study In Fractions

_Rabbit Hole_

Kurt had been following Blaine through the maze of tunnels for what felt like hours and very well might have been – with the kerosene lamp as their only light and no way to tell how far they'd gone, it was impossible to know how long they'd been moving. Blaine seemed to know exactly where he was going, so Kurt had no choice but to hold his tongue and trust that Blaine would get them out of the warren safely. He didn't know how else he was supposed to react.

The tunnel itself burrowed through the earth an alarming distance, twisting and bending and sloping up and down in such a complicated pattern that Kurt couldn't figure out if they were heading upwards or downwards. It branched off in all directions, too, and Kurt imagined that this was exactly what an anthill would be like inside if he were only a quarter inch tall.

Kurt repeatedly had to bite back his questions of how long the warren had been there, what kind of creature had made it, and how it related to the Andersons, since he knew that Blaine would only tell him to be quiet until they were back in the fresh air of the aboveground.

But when he noticed claw marks – _huge_ claw marks – gouged in a rock in the side of the tunnel, he couldn't hold back.

"Blaine, what lives down here?" he pressed.

"You don't want to know."

"Yes, I do! I'm sick of these cryptic 'answers' you keep giving me," Kurt snapped. "I want to know what's making you so scared."

Blaine sighed, stopping in his tracks.

Kurt waited.

"Kurt, what my dad and I do… It's not generally considered to be something real," Blaine said slowly. "If we were to go to the police and ask for help, they'd call the guys in white coats. But…" He swallowed, pressing his lips together for a moment before continuing. "People die, Kurt. They _die_ because of what's down here, and that's why we're doing it."

"I don't understand."

Blaine paused for a moment, his jaw twitching. "I want to keep you alive, Kurt. I don't want you involved."

"Bit late for that, don't you think?" Kurt said, arching his eyebrows and holding up the gun that Blaine had given him.

"So long as you're still breathing, it's not," Blaine said flatly. "Come on. We've got a ways to go."

Kurt shivered and made sure to stay extra close.

A few hundred yards further and Blaine abruptly stopped and backed up, his breath quickening.

"What? What is it?"

Blaine turned around, shining the lantern back in the direction they'd come. "I – I think I made a wrong turn somewhere. This isn't where we want to be."

"I thought you knew your way around in here," Kurt said, his stomach twisting. The gun in his hand suddenly felt heavier, clumsy and crude. Like it was only offering an illusion of protection.

"I haven't been down here since—" Blaine cut himself off, quickly changing the ending of his sentence to, "—in a while."

Kurt peered into the darkness beyond the flickering light cast by the lantern. "Well, are you sure?" he asked. "All the tunnels look the same to me."

"_Yes, I'm sure_," Blaine hissed. He was even more frightened than Kurt was. "We can't go this way. We have to go back." He grabbed Kurt's arm and pulled him back the way they'd come.

Kurt felt his heartbeat speed up – if Blaine was panicking, then there had to be a _very _good reason for it, and Kurt wasn't entirely sure he wanted to know what that reason was. He waited until Blaine's pace had slowed down (they'd doubled back for at least five hundred yards before they were able to turn down a different branch of the tunnel) to ask him what had made him turn back.

Blaine didn't respond for a long time, and Kurt waited. The rocks and clods of dirt crunching and grinding against the soles of their shoes was the only sound, and the blistered skin on Kurt's hands dully throbbed as they walked.

Several minutes later, just as Kurt was beginning to think he wasn't going to answer, Blaine spoke.

"That other tunnel…" he started, looking straight ahead and deliberately not at Kurt. "My brother died there."

Kurt's mouth fell open. "Your— I'm so sorry." He'd seen the photos of Cooper Anderson around the house, but when he'd asked Blaine about his brother, Blaine had only said that they didn't see him any more. He'd assumed they were estranged for some reason, not… He shuddered, keenly aware that he probably would have suffered the same fate (whatever that fate was, since Blaine _still_ hadn't explained) if Blaine had not chased after him.

"He was nineteen," Blaine said.

"How old were you?"

"Twelve." Blaine chewed on the inside of his cheek, hefting the rifle strapped to his shoulder. The lamplight highlighted the contours of his face and made his cheeks look hollow.

Kurt didn't really know what to say, but then a loud _squelch_ diverted their attention to the floor. Kurt grimaced, pulling his foot up from where it had sunk two inches into the mud.

Blaine breathed a sigh of relief. "We're almost there," he said.

"What?"

"This water – it soaks through the ground from Hog Creek."

Kurt's eyes opened wide. "Hog Creek?" he echoed. "But that's… that's at least three miles from your house!"

"Three miles as the crow flies – four if you go through the warren," Blaine said, treading more carefully over the muddy floor.

Kurt gave up on keeping his shoes clean and squelched through the mud alongside Blaine. "How big is the warren?" he asked.

"We don't know. It's too dangerous to just go exploring on a whim."

Kurt wanted to ask why Blaine knew the way through the tunnels if it was so dangerous, but something caught his eye at the edge of the lamplight up ahead, and he stopped short, grabbing Blaine's arm. "What is that?" he squeaked.

Blaine lifted the lantern higher, and Kurt felt the bottom drop out of his stomach.

A corpse was lying half-submerged in the mud.

"…Crap," said Blaine, approaching the body and crouching next to it.

Kurt nervously edged up behind him, his palm sweaty against the handle of the gun. He peered over Blaine's shoulder, then promptly turned around and vomited onto the tunnel floor.

"You okay?" Blaine asked.

Kurt wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. "Who is he?" he croaked, purposefully facing away. "Do you know him?"

"His name is Angus Mills," Blaine said, examining the old man's corpse in the lamplight. One of the arms was missing, as well as half of the other arm, both legs, and a large chunk of the torso. "He worked as the cemetery caretaker over at Weeping Willows. He was a friend of the family."

"You don't seem upset," Kurt said, not caring that it came out sounding accusatory.

"We already knew he was dead," Blaine stated, like it was no big deal. "He and his trainee have been missing for weeks, and there was a sinkhole in the cemetery; it wasn't hard to figure out what happened. This is just confirmation."

"Wait, his trainee?" Kurt choked out. "There's another one?"

Blaine stood up, brushing off his knees. "If there's anything left of Neil, we probably won't find it," he said. "Come on." He stepped over Angus Mills' body, then waited for Kurt to do the same.

Kurt shook his head. "I am not going near that," he said, gesturing to the remains.

Blaine gave him a hard look. "If you want to get out of here, then you have to come this way. Or else _you_ will end up missing three of your limbs." Kurt flinched, and Blaine's expression softened. "I'm sorry, Kurt, I just… we need to get out, and it's only five more minutes in this direction. Otherwise, we'd be wandering around down here for _days_ and I'd get _really_ lost."

Kurt tried to swallow the bile in his throat, but only succeeded in making himself feel more nauseous.

"Please," said Blaine.

Steadying his nerves as best he could, Kurt decided that he liked his body better as one whole piece. He had to grit his teeth and clench his fists, but somehow he was able to force himself to step carefully around the place where Angus Mills' legs should have been lying.

"If you need to throw up again, that's okay," said Blaine. "The first time I saw a dead guy I didn't eat for a week. Couldn't keep it down."

Kurt gaped at him. "How many dead people have you seen?"

Blaine kept walking down the tunnel as if he hadn't heard the question.


End file.
